Mending Broken Hearts
by onethirdparty
Summary: Asada has been broken all of her life, constantly attacked by those around her. But after a violent attack from Endou a boy with onyx hair appears in her life. And little would she know, that together they would enter the death game.
1. Prolouge

Perspective: Shino Asada

The cold winter air blows through my hair as I walk out of the school building. The sky is gray and devoid of any kind of life. Depressing, but not as depressing as everything around me. Students walk out of the school building smiling and talking to their friends, but as I walk out, all that follows are stares. Some kids laugh and point at me while they jokingly run away while others either stare or cower in fear. Teenagers are truly the most cruel people on this planet.

I sigh as I turn and walk towards the gate in silence. I watch as the cars shoot down the road while they splash water into the air as they zoom by. I recognize one of the cars being someone from the school and they quickly start to get closer to me. I try to get away, but I can't avoid the huge torrent of water that splashes over my body. Normally I would yell at the person as they drove away, but this has become an almost daaily occurrence. I realize now that no one can hear my screams. So, I proceed onwards in silence. I look up at the trees planted on the sidewalk, but because it is winter, they are devoid of any type of life.

After 15 minutes of walking, I approach the alleyway that is a shortcut back to my apartment. It is only around 3 meters wide and the towering red brick walls of the two buildings give off the typical vibe of a dangerous alleyway where all the criminals hide behind. But, because I've walked this way for a few months now, it does not intimidate me. It beats walking for 45 minutes on the sidewalk. I walk further into the alleyway, but three figures block my way.

"Oh Asada-san! How are you? We tried talking to you in lunch today, but you completely ignored us. It's not nice to be rude to your friends you know~"

"The only thing you are is a cold and evil bitch, Endou."

"How mean of you Shino! She says in a mocking sound of hurt.

"I'm done here." I say as I begin to walk off

"Grab her." Before I can react, Endou and her lackeys grab onto me and start pulling me back. I turn around and punch the taller one in her jaw, causing her to stumble back. But the other one throws a punch into my stomach and kicks me in my leg, knocking me down. The tall one has recovered and kicks me in the stomach, causing me to moan in pain and a bit of blood to flow into my mouth.

"Now Asada, there is this new lipstick that I want to buy that I don't have the money for, so would you be so kind as to give me what you have?

I look her dead in the eyes and spit the blood into her face, causing her to jump back in disgust.

"Fuck off."

"Well, I guess I'm going to have to bring out your favorite toy." She reaches into her purse and pulls out a bb gun. I kick back, trying to get away from the gun, but Endou's lackeys hold me down. I scream as loud as I can, but Endou quickly comes and muffled my mouth with her free hand. She places the gun to my head and begins to pull the trigger even though it is empty.

"Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang!" She says with a saadistic smile on her face.

"GET THE FUCK OFF HER!" A voice booms from outside the alley. I watch as a boy with onyx hair and eyes comes from the alley and kicks Endou in the face before tey can react. He grabs the tall lackey to my right and throws her against the wall, punching her repeatedly in the ribcage. The other lackey gets up and tries to attack him, but he turns around quickly and punches her in the face, causing a little bit of blood to fly out of her mouth and stumble back. Endou recovers from the kick and turns to face te boy.

"You bastard! You can't hit girls like that!"

"Well you are and plus all I see is three cows bullying a girl, so I had perfect reason to stop them."

"You asshole! She's a freak and a murderer!"

"Oh what's that, is the cow getting angry? Get out of here before I beat your asses to a pulp."

"Fuck yourself Kirigaya! We're leaving." They quickly run out from where the boy came, he watches them with a look of pure rage in his eyes. I turn and look down at myself, I have blood leaking out of my mouth and some of Endou's blood is on my uniform, suddenly it seems as if blood is just pooling out everywhere and everything is being consumed by it. I feel my breath becoming extremely labored and I begin to shake in fear. I think the boy, Kirigaya, notices this and he quickly runs towards me asking if I am okay. He wraps his arms around me and begins to whisper coos of comfort into my ears, without thinking, I lunge onto him and into his lap. I hold him as tightly as I could while I completely broke down into his chest. He strokes my hair gently as I cry. I may not know him, but as of right now I need him to stay with me. Rain begins to pour down heavily causing us to get soaking wet, but surprisingly he doesn't move and neither do I. Before I realize it, I begin to fade completely out of consciousness.

When I wake up, I find myself in an unfamiliar room. The room is pretty dark and it seems to be a bedroom. To my right there is a large computer desk with many different monitors and setups. The room itself is pretty bland, though clothing is thrown lazily around the room. I look back to the desk and notice that there's a few magazines on it, one of which had the title NerveGear. Curiously, I reach for it but before realizing what previously transpired and where I am now. I try to get up, but the pain erupts from my stomach. I look down to see a large bruise has formed. Just then, the door opens revealing Kirigaya with a tray full of food.

"Hey, sorry that my room is a mess. I just couldn't think of where else to put you." He says awkwardly

"Kirigaya... You're the representative of the freshman class right?"

"Yeah, I a..."

"Why did you even bother helping me, surely you heard the rumors."

"Yeah, I have Shino-san, but I don't believe them. How can you blame me for wanting to help?" He says as he takes a sip of water "Are you hungry? I just made dinner and I thought you'd want some."

"Thank you." I say as I take a bowl, the food smells kinda nice. "How did o get here?"

"I took you on the train, I'm pretty sure you wouldn't want to stay in the rain like that."

"In front of all those people?! Are you insane?!"

"Don't worry, I explained that you were hurt and they let us have a private room in the front."

"You didn't do anything weird did you?" I say glaring at him

"Of course not! I'd never do anything like that!" He says with a huge blush on his face, it looks kinda cute and it makes me chuckle.

"What's so funny?"

"Eh, it's nothing Kirigaya. Thank you for taking me here."

"It's no problem, but you need to spend the night here. It's really late and you're hurt. I can't let you walk home. Do you want to call home or anything?"

"No, it's alright. I live in an apartment alone anyway."

"Really? That sounds awesome!"

"Whatever you say, Kirigaya."

We finish the rest of dinner in peaceful silence. The food's not that bad, but not that good, but it's warm so I'm happy. Despite my insistence, Kirigaya wouldn't let me take the sleeping bag. So I stay in his bed while he sleeps on the floor beside the bed. Looking down at him, his face seems quite peaceful. I'd normally be against all of this, but because of what happened today, I can't voice any protest. Next thing I know, I fall back onto the bed and drift off to sleep.

Author's Note: Hello everyone! I'm back with a new fanfiction that I did randomly in the middle of the SOL or Shit Out of Luck testing period. I got to write this because I wasn't taking a test and I had free time to do whatever I want while I waited for normal classes to begin. Anyway, because summer and more tests are coming up, I'll probably have a lot more free time to write. I've made a recovery from my sickness and now I can kick ass again. This chapter may be kind of short in my standards, but I think it's good because it establishes the plot, the fluff, and the fighting descriptions all in one. This shit's gonna get violent in later chapters so have fun. But know, that in the end there will always be fluff somewhere. Sorry if there are ever paragraphs that somehow get to the top of the test document, my phone is weird like that. Later everyone!


	2. Chapter 1

Perspective: Kazuto Kirigaya

I open my eyes to find that I am standing in the middle of grandfather's dojo. The walls are covered with dark wood and the floor is clear as ever. Looking up, I watch as two figures enter the room. One being my grandad and the other looks like a younger version of myself. The younger me has tears streaming down his face and grandad is gritting his teeth and staring at the younger me with eyes full of wage as he pulls on his long grey hair.

"Grandpa, I'm sorry, I just can't do it any lon…."

*SMACK*

"You little ungrateful little brat! You have been doing this for so many years now and you decide to quit now?! Do you know how much hard work I put into training you?!"

"I'm sorry grandad..."

"SHUT UP!" He bellow as he throws a punch into my younger self's stomach. I try to run up and stop them, but I find that I can't move. I look down and darkness is starting to consume the room. The younger me is walling in pain and tears and snot streak down his face, while I notice a younger Suguha and my aunt run into the room and pull my grandad away from me. I can hear my aunt and my grandfather yelling at each other from the other room and Suguha and my younger self are sobbing into each other's arms. So it's this memory huh. But before I can react, the darkness consumes everything and I am greeted with someone staring down at me. I jump and slam my head into the person's head, causing them to rear back in pain. Wait a minute, why is this girl in my room?! Could this be the beginning of my very harem?! Before I can be stupid in my head any longer, the events of yesterday come flooding back, why is she out of bed?!

"Shino, why did you get out of bed, you're hurt and you need to re..."

"Because you were crying, Kirigaya."

Huh?

I feel my face and it feels damp with tears

"Do you want to talk about it?"

"No. I'm fine." I say coldly. She can't know about this, no one outside of my family can.

"Okay…. But if you need to talk I'm here. I can't really get far with this bruise y'know." She says chuckling

I nod and tell her I'm going down to make us breakfast, she tries to get up to help but I force her to get back to the bed. Damn she is stubborn! Going down the stairs, I look to see Suguha cooking breakfast. This ought to be a good time to mess with her. She's facing the stove and listening to music with two earphones in her eyes. I go up behind her and grab one of the knives that were on the counter and quickly move it to the other side of the kitchen. I stay behind her do she doesn't see me. When she goes and reaches for the knife, she looks confused and I quickly hide behind the counter topping ducking. I watch as she franticly searches around the room for it. When she's getting close to it, I quickly jump up and walk behind her. Before she can grab the knife, I rip one of her earphones out of her ear.

"BOO"

"AHH"

*SMACK*

*THUD*

Huh, when did the floor get here?

"Oni-chan! You can't be scaring me like that!" She says with a pout

"Sorry Suguha, but I couldn't resist."

"Are you okay?"

"Yeah, I'm fine." I say as I yawn

"So, how was spending the night with that cute girl?" She says with a small grin. This causes me to trip and I slam my head against the table and into the floor. I have a feeling that I'm going to be having more dates with the floor in the future. Suguha looks worried for a second, but after seeing my blushing face, she begins laughing. Do you not care for your dear Oni-chan?!

"It's not like that!"

"Heheh. I know Oni-chan, I'm just messing with you." She says smiling at me warmly "How is she doing? She looked pretty beat-up when you brought here her last night."

"I think she's doing fine, but there is a large bruise on her stomach and I know she won't be able to walk for a while."

"Is that so?" She says, as she reaches for her cup of coffee, when did she make coffee? After placing it down again having taken a few sips, she grabs the knife and moves over to the stove, where I notice about 5 tomatoes sitting on the cutting board.

"Really Suguha? How much tomato salad do you even eat?"

"Want some, Oni-chan?"

"I'll pass." I say as I move towards the refrigerator, looking inside, I see that we have only a gallon of milk and 3 eggs left in terms of breakfast items. I should probably stop for groceries today huh? Or maybe aunt will do it, but she's normally busy with work. [1] Guess I'll go. I grab two eggs and the gallon of milk from the refrigerator and place them on the counter and head to the cabinets to grab some flour. I'll make pancakes today. I begin going through the recipe based off of my memory, before hearing something moving.

*THUD*

I look back to see Shino kneeling at the stairway, breathing heavily as she holds her stomach.

"SHINO!" I say as I run toward her and grab her so she is resting on my side "Are you okay?! Why did you come down here?"

"Umm, I wanted to know where the restroom was." Oh. Shit

"It's down the hallway to the right." Suguha says as she comes from around the counter, she lifts Shino up and takes her from my grasp.

"Thank you, urm…"

"Suguha."

"Right, thank you Suguha-san"

They disappear around the corner from the hallway so I continue to make the pancakes. After around 10 minutes, Suguha and Shino come back into the living room with Shino still in a limp holding onto Suguha. Suguha moves Shino to the couch, much to the relief of Shino and comes around the counter again and finishes preparing the salad. I think the pancake batter is almost done, so I grab a pan and place it on the stove turning it on, and placing the batter on it. I look back to Shino and I notice that she's somewhat drooling. I laugh, which causes her to notice my staring and she blushes heavily. Suguha also notices this and punches me in the shoulder. Causing me to rub my arm and pain, which causes both Shino and Suguha to giggle. Why do you guys enjoy my suffering? I make three pancakes and place them on a plate and give them to Shino, to which the thanks me and says thanks for the meal. I make another 4 and do the same, and Suguha sits down with us. I flip on the television and flip it to a channel with anime, I think this anime is called Kabeneri of Iron Fortress [2] The main character, Ikoma is fighting Kabane as the train with all of the officials and civilians watch him as he moves to lower a gear. This anime is actually pretty damn good. Shino looks mesmerized by it and Suguha looks kind of afraid, I think she's scared of the undead. It's only fair because you hurt your dear Oni-Chan. Looking at the time, I notice that it's nearing 8 which means I need to start walking to school. I grab my things and proceed to walk out the door only to be stopped my Shino calling me.

"Kirigaya"

"Hmm?"

"I'm going with you, just give me a sec…" She says only to collapse on the coach. I run over to her and help her get steady

"I need to go to school today, I have to get my notes."

"I can take them for you, don't worry."

"But we're only in one class together, how can you even ge…"

"I'm going into all of your classes today in your place, I'll copy notes for you."

"You're being stupid Kirigaya, you have classes too you know."

"Don't worry about it, I have straight A's. I'll be fine."

"Show off." Hey! I work hard in school you know. I stand up and wave her goodbye as Suguha also begins to leave and head towards her school, leaving Shino alone. I hope she doesn't try to do anything rash while I'm gone, I'd rather her not hurt herself. Today is going to be quite awkward to explain the situation to both my teachers and Shino's. I'm lucky I swiped her class list at the last minute when she was asleep.

Perspective: Shino

Well, now I'm alone in Kazuto Kirigaya's house, the fresh prince of bel air, I mean the freshman prince of the high school [3]. Looking around, it doesn't take one long to notice that Kirigaya lives comfortably. The walls are dark, along with the floor, but the floor is very clean and I think this is Mahogany. The massive TV they have implanted into the wall doesn't help to the hide fact that they are rich either. I decide to flip on the internet function of the television and go to kissanime [4] to watch the rest of Kabeneri, which takes me around 5 hours to finish. It was actually pretty good. I'm kind of hungry, but I choose to ignore it because I don't want to barge into their kitchen. I sit on the couch, thinking about everything that's happened in these two days. I don't even know why I agreed to be here with them, if they knew who I was they'd probably hate me and throw me onto the street…. Or finish me off…. But the thought of what Kirigaya said "I don't believe them" comes back to me and I smile a little bit. I've heard that he was stupid nice. I decide to watch a few random anime for the next couple of hours when I hear the door burst open, revealing Kazuto, drenched in sweat. What the hell is wrong with him? Before I can ask anything, he quickly sprints up the stairs and into his room. Okay Kirigaya, what the hell is going on? I stand up, but the pain in my stomach starts to come back with a vengeance, causing me to stumble. I won't let that beat me though. I slowly get up and head up the stairs into his room opening the door slightly to see if he is in there. I look to see that he is on his computer reading through an email when he suddenly jumps up into the air and does a few fist bumps. He looks like a little kid with his excitement. This causes me to laugh, which makes him notice my presence and he begins to blush uncontrollably, which makes me laugh even harder. This boy is so damn cute sometimes.

"Heheheheheh"

"Umm, I…"

"HAHAHAHAHAHA"

"It's not that funny!" He pouts as he blushes uncontrollable, geez Kirigaya, you're going to kill my heart with those types of reactions.

"Whatever you say, Kirigaya. Heh" I say after my giggle fit was over, "What were so excited over?"

"Well, umm… I got into a video game beta, I'm kind of a nerd heheh" He says, rubbing the back of his head

"What kind of video game is it?"

"It's a game called Sword Art Online, it's virtual reality so you can move around and be totally immersed into the game, it's like you can get away from reality."

Get away from reality?

"Where do I sign up?"

"Eh?"

"Where do I sign up? I want to know."

"On their website, but you need an email."

"I have one, can I register here?"

"Sure, I don't mind… But it's a very small chance that you can get in, only a thousand make it in."

"It's worth a shot."

I go through the whole registration, filling out everything required, date of birth, etc. I have to get into this game. If it means that I can finally escape from reality than I can finally be free. I can finally be strong. Kazuto looks a little confused at my determination, but I ignore it. The only thing on my mind is this game. I will become strong in this virtual world.

Author's Note: Hello my babies, It's Papa Onethirdparty here. I hope you guys like the first real chapter of the story. I put a lot of work into this you know. We got fluff, we got foreshadowing, and we got backstory. You know, all the good shit. I'm going to rush through most of the beta so we can actually get to the full release, but I will be including some moments with Kazuto and Asada in school. I've also tried doing a bit of referencing in my stories now, so I hope you guys enjoy it. Anyway, here are the references.

[1] "Guess I'll go." A line from One Punch Man, that Saitama says when there's trouble

[2] Kabaneri of the Iron Fortress, a really good anime that is out. At the time of this been writing it has 7 episodes with one coming out tomorrow. I really recommend it

[3] Fresh Prince of Bel Air, a common meme that is still good no matter what you say

[4] kissanime, the best anime watching site as of now, seriously, why aren't you using it?

See you guys next chapter!


	3. Chapter 2

Perspective: Kazuto

Time: 8:00am

I walk at the door and begin walking along the sidewalk to school. The weather has cleared up quite a bit from last night and now the sky is a bright blue, with the sun still rising from the horizon. Still, I wish it wasn't so damn wet and cold. The trees are drizzling some water onto my head, which is kind of annoying, but I can deal with it. As I walk, my mind starts drifting back to the events of yesterday. Why has Shino never spoken about this to anyone? I mean, giving all the abuse that those girls throw at her, why didn't she just go to the police or an adult. But, looking at the rumors that surround her, I'm sure those girls would make up some kind of lie to make her look bad. I probably shouldn't have hurt them to bad, but those cows deserved it. Whatever, I'll explain everything to the administration of I get called up for it, I even have video of the whole thing. That's what the get for picking on a cute girl like Shino.

Wait cute?

Did I just call Shino cute?! But it is kind of true, she does have a cute body and her laugh is really soothing…

BRAIN. STOP.

Ok, moving on from those thoughts, I finally make it to the school building. The schools massive walls were really intimidating to me when I first came here, but now, somehow I have become the representative of the freshmen here and their "prince" Opening the gate, I receive many gazes of awe and envy among the students. I notice the same group of girls that always come to greet me are waiting by the entrance of the school and when they see me, they slowly walk up to me.

"Hello Kirigaya-kun! How are you today?"

"Hmm, I'm fine. I just have a lot to do today."

"Like what?"

"I'm just going to a friend's class to take notes for her, that's all."

"Ohhh? Is she your girlfriend?" I can feel the cheeks start to boil

"No… She's just a friend, that's all."

"Hmm, is that so? Well, have fun then." The leader of the group says, as they walk off giggling to themselves. I sigh and head into the building and head up the stairs towards Shino's first class, European History class. I walk into the class and have all of the students inside stare at me with wide eyes, I ignore them and head directly up to the teacher, a foreigner named Mrs. Davis and explain the situation to her. I think she feels very sympathetic towards Shino because she lets me stay, taking Shino's seat. With that, I head to all of my teachers' rooms and explain the situation to them, to which they all agree to pardon my absence. Heading back to the European class just before the bell rings and sit down and begin taking notes. The students are still staring at me and I hear some of them mumbling.

"Why is the prince here?"

"Is he copying notes for someone?"

"Isn't that seat Asada Shino's? You know, the girl that murdered someone?"

"I don't think so, I'm sure the prince would be friends with a murderer like her. I mean, he's perfect and she's so corrupt!"

These kids, I feel so bad for Shino. I'm pretty sure that she hears this kind of thing every day with these kids. The teacher notices the chatter and quickly shuts them up and continues on with the lesson. Currently, we are going over the Unification of Germany by Otto Von Bismarck. This guy sounds like he's no joke. I guess I was too busy copying notes and didn't notice that Mrs. Davis called on me.

"Kirigaya-kun."

"Yes, Sensei?"

"Could you please explain to the class what the policy of Otto Von Bismarck was and what it detailed."

"Yes. The policy that Bismarck used to unify Germany was called blood and iron. It involved Unification of Germany through any means necessary, including going to war with both Austria and France in order to do so. The parties that opposed unification were generally put down, but some aspects of them were catered too by Bismarck, for example, Bismarck banned Socialist parties in Germany, but provided state ran insurance that baffled the minds of the socialists and kept them happy. Blood and Iron was also used in Italian Unification on another note."

"Very good." The class starts clapping for me, but I choose to ignore it and sit back down without another word. Class goes smoothly enough and when it's over, I quickly rush to her second class and repeat. Before I know it, the lunch bell goes off and students begin rushing out of the narrow hallways. I make my way towards the roof and sit down on the top of one of the storage closets. I reach for my bag and look for my bento, but I can't seem to find it. Shit! I forgot to pack it last night when I was with Asada. Oh well, I guess I can just relax up her; it beats going into the cafeteria and getting swarmed by a horde of students. I decide to lie down and stare up at that blue sky. I wonder if the skies in SAO will look like this. From the trailers, they looked absolutely incredible. I pull out my phone and load an episode of RE: Zero kara [1] and start watching. The episode ends just in time because now we have to go back to class. Going down the stairs, I scan the hallway of students and soon spot the cows that were bullying Shino. They seem really pissed off and people are staring at their wounds. They totally deserved that though. I make it back to class and hear over the intercom a voice call out

" _Kazuto Kirigaya to the principal's office immediately"_

Oh shit. Well, I already have a pretty good guess about what this is about. I sigh and inform the teacher that I am leaving and the students in the room stare at me curiously. After a few minutes of walking, I finally make it to the principal's office on the third floor of the building. Walking in, I am greeted by the dark walls of the room and the office smell of the room. Although it's not pleasant, it's not horrible either. I talk to the woman standing at the front desk and she leads towards the back room, where the principal does his business I get. When I open the door, I am greeted by two 6 foot police officers and the principal staring at me with a look of anger in his eyes. Well here we go.

"Kirigaya-kun. Would you mind explaining to these fine gentleman and myself of why you attacked Endou and her friends yesterday?"

"Because they were attacking another student and I had to step in. She would have died."

"From what Endou and her girls described, you came into the alleyway on their way home and started to repeatedly hit them and also threatened to rape them, is this true?" He asks, which causes the two police officers to start getting ready, I think one of them is reaching for the handcuffs.

"No, it is not."

"Do you have proof of this, because we do know that you did go into the alleys and the girls were harmed, as seen from a nearby security camera and the girl's wounds themselves."

"I have a complete video of the events that transpired on my phone, May I?"

"Of course." I pull out my phone and head to my gallery, pulling up the video and playing it. The alleyway comes up with Endou and her lackeys holding Asada down and hitting her, along with Endou getting on top of Asada and repeating those cold worlds "Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang!" The police officers and the principal are staring at the video in stunned silence. The video ends with them running off and me wrapping my arms around Asada and having her cry into my chest.

"Kirigaya-kun… Was that Asada Shino from Class 2F?"

"Yes, as I said I stepped in because Asada was in danger."

"Damn, I should have known that she was in trouble, I mean giving her circumstances and her past, she's had it rough here. I've been doing my best to help trying to get her to talk to councilors but she refuses. I don't think she trusts them. I'd like to personally say thank you for doing this." One of the police officers grabs me by the shoulder and turns me to face him.

"Where is Asada Shino now?"

"She's currently at my house, due to the weather last night and the fact she cannot walk due to her injuries, I could not take her home."

"Thank you, personally, I'd like to believe you and prosecute those girls accordingly here and now, but sadly we have to go through the court process. You will more than likely be brought into the police station for questioning as well as with Asada Shino. I wish you both luck and if there is a court case, that video will be a great piece of evidence. Keep it safe." With that, the police officers proceed to walk out of the room leaving only the principal and myself.

"I'd like to say thank you again, Kazuto. I hope you're okay with me calling you by your first name. I know that Asada's a nice girl, so thank you for protecting her."

"It just came naturally to me, it's not a problem."

"Take care, Kazuto."

"You too."

With that, I head to her final class for the day, home economics. Apparently today that were supposed to be making sweets. I get to work and start making the batter with eggs and milk. Some of the students are staring at me with awe that I know how to cook but I ignore them. Maybe these will be a good treat for Shino when I get home. Soon enough, the bell rings which releases all of the students. I take a few cupcakes that I made and place them in a plastic bag in my book bag. Then, I made the walk home. I have a feeling that what happens in court today is going to get nasty. I think I should start planning and making arrangements. When I pull up the phone, I notice that it's January 17th. SHIT! SAO Beta registration forms are supposed to release results today! I quickly start to sprint down the street towards my house. I hope Shino doesn't think I'm weird coming home in a sweat.

Perspective: Asada Shino

Now that I submitted my application for the beta, we decide to move back down to the first floor of his house. An easier task said than done. Kazuto ended up having to pick me up and carry me bridal style down the stairway. It was really embarrassing for both of us, but a part of me really did enjoy it. We both sit down next to each other on the couch and we begin to idly chatting. After a while, Kazuto runs up stairs to grab his book bag and the notes inside of it and he starts explaining what I missed. I've always liked my history teacher because she's been so cool and understanding and Kazuto really captures the tone she uses to teach the class. He makes it really interesting and easy to understand. After a while, he pulls out a plastic bag with strawberry cupcakes in them.

"Where did you get these?"

"You guys had to cook them in Home Economics, I decided to bring a few home for you."

"Is that so… Thank you, Kazuto."

He blushes a little at me calling him by his first name, but he's been calling me Shino this whole time so I guess we're even. He gets up to grab two cups of milk and places them on the coffee table in front of us. We resume idly chatting until Kazuto starts looking a little down casted.

"Kazuto, is something wrong?"

"Well, I don't know if something is wrong for you and I per say, but we have something serious to deal with." He says slowly "I was pulled into the principal's office at the end of the day today and two police officers and the principal questioned me about what happened yesterday."

Why did I think I could get away from this? Why does it always have to come back and haunt me?

"Endou and her lackeys apparently tried to accuse me of attacking and threatening rape on them." Kazuto! NO! And just because you tried to help me, now you're going to have to suffer. I need to get away, I can't hurt you any…

"But luckily, I had video of the whole thing, of them attacking you."

"Eh?"

"I showed the whole video to the police officers and the principal and they let me go, but we may have to come into the police station for questioning and probably court as well. I just wanted to let you know." I can feel tears starting to build up in my eyes and I lunge at him and wrap my arms around him. The pain from my bruise causes me to wince, but I don't let go.

"Thank you, Kazuto. Thank you." He looks at me, smiles, and then in return wraps his arms around my body in turn. For a while we stay there in silence, apart from my light sobbing and him comforting me. He actually is really sweet. What we didn't notice is that two people had opened the door and walked in. Suguha and what I presume to be his aunt.

"Oh my, Kazuto. Getting quite comfy aren't we?" His aunt says with a teasing smile

"Oni-chan, I approve!"

We quickly move away from each other, with massive blushes on our faces as Kazuto tried to explain the situation.

"It's not what you think, it's just that, I…"

"It's okay, Kazuto. I'm sure you have your reasons." This causes him to sigh and defeat and I can't help but giggle at him. He then becomes serious again and proceeds to explain everything that happened today to them. They look a little concerned, but I can tell they trust Kazuto. I think I can trust him too. We decide to watch anime in the living room while having dinner and commentate on the anime. I look at the time and realize that it's nearing 8 o'clock. I try to tell Kazuto that it'd be best if I head home for tonight, but he wouldn't listen. After about 15 minutes of arguing, I eventually submit to him. I have a feeling I'm going to be here for a while. He then picks me up in the same bridal position and carries me upstairs, much to the pleasure of his aunt and sister below who are jokingly cheering him on. He puts me down at the door and we both head in. I get in the sleeping bag and he gets into bed and is about to go to sleep.

"Hey, Kazuto."

"Yeah?"

"Thank you for being here for me, you have no idea what it's been like to be alone for so long."

"I think I have somewhat of an idea, but I'd rather you not have to go through that. I don't want anyone I care about to go through anything like you have again." I turn to look at him and his eyes are filled with determination. I haven't seen any kind of eyes like that in my whole life and it puts me at ease. With that, we say goodnight and I finally drift into sleep

Author's Note: Two updates in two days?! I'm insane. Anyway, we got to see the day through Kazuto's point of view and now we are going to start having some real conflict. Also, I'd like to give a shout out to Unoyoko94, I appreciate the reviews man, but I want more reviews on this story. I really enjoy reading them. So all of my followers and people reading this story, please drop a review in. Anyway, I hope you guys enjoyed this chapter. See you the next update!

PS: HAIL TO LONGER CHAPTERS!

References:

[1] RE: Zero Kara, a really good anime that I recommend watching


	4. Chapter 3

Perspective: Kazuto

Date: November 6th, 2022

The sun shines through the large window panels of the stairway leading up to the roof of the school; so much so that it is somewhat blinding but I ignore it and continue onward. I make it to the roof and sit down in my usual spot and wait for Shino to arrive. I start to think back to when I first met her, defending her from those three cows and how close we've became over the months. People in our school eventually found out about our friendship and many started to distance themselves from me. Honestly, I'm glad about that; all the attention was pretty annoying to me. I stare up at the clear blue sky, even though the temperature has been dropping because of fall, I feel at peace. I can't help but grin as I start to think about my friendship with Shino. We've been pretty close ever since the incident with her bullies, although she was still quite reserved at the time, she soon opened up and now she comes over to my house almost daily. Sometimes during lunch she, rather than eating, decides to crawl into my lap and take a short nap. I don't mind it though; she is my closest friend after all. One time we both ended up falling asleep for the entirety of third period and we both were yelled at by our Algebra teacher. I explained to the teacher the whole situation and Shino started to blush madly which caused the teacher and myself to laugh. I love when she's embarrassed like that, it's cute.

"What are you grinning about?" I look over to see Shino walking through the doorway with a small smirk on her face

"Nothing much, just thinking about everything that's happened." Shino then runs up to me and curls up into my lap.

"SAO is coming out today, are you excited?" I ask as I pull up the anime they made for the release of the game

"Yeah… I haven't had that much fun in a game since ever, I never really played video games before SAO."

"Yeah, I could tell. I had to carry you along and teach you all the way to level 10."

"Whatever! Don't forget how many times I had to save your ass when you took on bosses by yourself." She says as she lightly punches me in my arm. I laugh and lazily wrap one arm around her and she responds by placing in her head under my chin. We're on the final episode of the SAO anime and we always do commentary on it. One thing we can agree on is that the main character is just a huge stud. The anime mainly follows what the game's story is supposed to be and it's somewhat interesting. But now, we get to experience the real thing when we get home today. Shino will even be coming over to spend the night in celebration of it and I'm stoked. Before we can finish the episode, the warning bell rings signaling us to head back to class.

[A few hours later]

*RING* 

"Alright class, be sure to have your assignments in by the end of the weekend. I'll be checking my email for them."

Some of the class begins to move towards the door while some sit lazily at their desk and begin chatting. I waste no time and take off down the hallway, earning stares from some of the other students. I ignore them and continue down the stairs where I find Shino waiting by the exit.

"Ready to go, Shino?"

"Yeah, let's go."

We start walking towards the gate where we notice Endou and her lackeys standing at the gate talking. They notice us and glare at us. We try to ignore them and continue through, but they block our way.

"Still hanging out with the freak, Kazuto? How far can a prince fall?" Endou says smirking at me. Before I can respond, Shino speaks up.

"You should stop speaking Endou, wouldn't want you to choke on your makeup. Though, I'm surprised your lackey hasn't eaten all of it yet." Damn. Shots just got fired over here.

"You bitch!" Endou says as she pushes Shino back. Shino just ignores it and begins to walk away from them.

"See you in court, Endou."

I follow behind her and I can feel the glares their firing at us, but I ignore them and continue to follow Shino. I can feel the wind begin to pick up, causing leaves from the trees planted on the sidewalk to scatter across the sidewalk and the road. The wind feels good through my hair. I look back to Shino and see that the wind is making her hair blow in the wind, she looks really beautiful.

Beautiful?

Ok Kazuto, it's time to purge your mind of those thoughts right now. You can't be thinking like that.

"Kazuto."

"Yeah?"

"Are you nervous?"

"Nervous about what?"

"The trial, it's less than a month away."

"I guess I am a little bit, but I know we won't lose. We weren't in the wrong for any of it, they were the ones that caused you so much torment."

"But what if they lock you up for being brutal to a girl? I don't want to lose you; I wouldn't know what to do… I.." I can see the tears in her eyes and I wrap my arms around her and stroke her head. It's sweet of her to worry about me.

"Don't worry Shino." I say as she looks up at me. "You're my closest friend, I don't care if they whole world wants us dead or hates us. We're always going to be friends and I'll stand by your side, that's what friends do." She smiles at that and we continue our walk back to my house in silence. When we walk through the door, I'm greeted with Suguha coming out of the kitchen.

"Oni-chan! Did you make Shino-Chan cry?! You devil!"

"No, he didn't make me cry. It's okay."

Despite Shino saying this, Suguha is giving me a death glare. I didn't do anything wrong this time, I swear! We bid Suguha goodbye and we head up into my room. Because Shino spends the night here a lot, I ended up buying a futon for my room for when she comes over. Shino opens up her backpack and pulls out her NerveGear and I grab mine. We both place the NerveGears on our head and walk up to each other.

"Ready?"

"Yeah, where do you want us to meet up?"

"How about at the south gate of the Town of Beginnings? Assuming we don't meet before then."

"Yeah that sounds good."

We both lie down and we look at each other before diving

"LINK START!" We both say in unison, taking us into the game. I go through the login procedure, entering my username and password. In front of me comes the name of my Avatar, Kirito, asking me if I want to use my beta character. Hitting yes, I am finally taken into the game. I open my eyes and take a look around. The air is warm and the sun shines bright. Taking a look around the plaza, I see the massive amounts of people logging in and standing around. Some are staring in amazement, some are talking to each other, and I even saw one try to summon a sword by calling out. What a noob. The massive amount of people here also makes it difficult to find anyone, guess I'm going to have to go to the south gate to find Shino. As I take off, I take a good look of my surroundings. The massive marble pillars that hold up the area around the plaza stand at around 50 meters tall and behind me stands the hall of fame where everyone is listed on the leaderboard. The walls of the Hall of Fame are made out of gray stone and its large dome roof structure makes it look impressive. I make it out of the plaza and into the southern shopping district. The area is filled with players looking at the different merchandise of the NPCs. Some are holding conversation with some of the NPCs and they look genuinely impressed that they are all voiced and can communicate. When you've been playing for a few months, that stuff gets old though. I take a sharp left and start heading down the alleyway until I hear a voice call out.

"HEY! You, the one that just went down the alleyway." I turn around to see a guy with red hair and bandana tied across his head come up to me. "Hey, you seem like you know your way around this place, would you mind helping a new guy out?"

"Uh, I'm kinda meeting up with someone from here…"

"Gah! I promise I won't get in your way, I just want some tips on fighting in the game."

"I sure Shin- I mean Sinon wouldn't mind if you came along. Come on, follow me."

"Thanks man! I owe you one." He says as we start weaving out of the alleyway and into another crowd. "My name's Klein by the way, what's yours?"

"My name's Kirito, nice to meet you." I turn around to shake his hand

"So, you're a beta tester right?"

"Yeah, I was."

"How was the beta for you guys, you're already pretty lucky to get into the full game. But with the beta, you had to be extremely lucky. Only One thousand players made it in."

"Yeah, I guess Sinon and I were pretty lucky." We make a turn left and move to a more residential area that is closer to the southern gate. I can see NPCs washing clothes and even some children running around playing in the road. The actual players around here seem to be looking for quests, but they're quite rare in the Town of Beginnings, given there's so many NPCs in the Town of Beginnings.

"What was the beta like? Was it fun?"

"For me, the beta was everything. I thought about it day and night and I'm sure Sinon did too. In this world it seems like you can go anywhere without limit. There's so much story and the combat in the game is amazing. There were times that I even wanted to forget about reality and just live in SAO. Here we are free from any type of harsh expectations of the world. I think that was what made SAO so revolutionary." Klein is staring at me in awe, I guess that was kind of weird for me to say. "Sorry if that was weird sounding, I just let me thoughts run rampant."

"No man, I think that's really cool. Though, I don't think I could ever be so serious about a game like you can. My job is killing me to be honest. Heh." He says laughing tiredly "So you must have made it pretty far into the beta, how far did you go."

"Let's just say, I made it to floors not many could reach." Before he can respond, we finally make it to the south gate where I see Shino waiting for me, scanning the area around here. When she spots me, she quickly runs towards us.

"Hey Kaz- I mean, Kirito! Where have you been?" I think she noticed Klein too

"Sorry, this guy said he needed help getting started. He's new to the game and he seems like a nice guy, his name is Klein."

"That's so like you Kirito, you always want to help someone." I look back to Klein and see that his body seems frozen in a state of shock. "Yo, Klein? Are you lagging or something? Hello?" I say as I wave my hand in front of him. Before I can react, he runs up to Shino and grabs her by both of her hands.

"Hi! My name's Klein, I'm 24 and I'm looking for someone who I can really bond wi-" Before I can even stop her, She throws a power kick directly to Klein's crotch, causing him to fall on the ground and roll around in pain.

"Hey, you do know that pain is turned off in this game right?" Shino says, glaring at him

"Oh yeah, gettin' kicked in the balls don't hurt. Guess it's just a force of habit." He says standing up "Sorry about that, I guess I was over stepping my boundaries."

"Kirito, I don't like this guy, can we go now?"

"Eh? That's kind of rude you know, Sinon. You should at least give the guy a chance."

"I'm sorry! I won't do that ever again, I just need some help starting off and learning combat mechanics!"

"Hmmm, fine. But remember I won't hesitate to strike you down. That goes for you too Kirito if you do something stupid."

"Yes, Sinon-sama!" We both say as we bow our heads

"Good boys. Now, let's get going."

Opening the gate, we are teleported out into the meadows of the Town of Beginnings. A large dirt road stretches out further southward, towards the village. The meadows are teeming with wild boars, which are grazing peacefully. There's also a small lake to the west and I can see many birds flying northward. Klein is staring with awe at the beauty and I think Shino was mesmerized by it for a minute. I laugh and I take off down the dirt road.

"Ok Klein! Watch this!"

I pull out the standard sword for starting players from my inventory and start sprinting towards the nearest boar. It stands at around half my height and roughly weighs around 90 kilograms. It notices my presence and its eyes begin to glow red. It starts charging at me and when it reaches me, I quickly dodge to the side and activate a sword skill, causing a large red slash to appear on its body. It roars and anger and begins to charge at me again. I run to meet it and hope over it, making a large slash on its back. But before I can react, it kicks me in the back of the legs, causing me to stumble and fall. I try to block, but the boar hits me with its tusk, making a large slash appear in my chest. I moan a bit in pain and decide that I have had enough of this. I jump up and grab its horn and use my sword to strike at its head. I watch as it explodes in a burst of blue polygons. I sigh and sit on the ground, guess I'm a bit rusty.

"Kirito! You need to be a bit more careful you know, you still feel pain in combat!"

"Seriously?! So I'm not immune from pain?!"

"Sorry Klein, only in Safe Zones."

"I am screwed! These bosses here look extremely difficult."

"Um Klein, you do realize these boars are the equivalents to slimes in other games, right?"

"Are you serious?! This is going to be impossible!" He says holding his head "And I was so stoked to play this too…" I put a hand on his shoulder to comfort him.

"Don't worry Klein, we got your back. Once you get the hang of it, it's easy."

The rest of the day consisted of us fighting many boars in the fields. Klein nearly had his ass handed to him, so we had to step in to prevent that from happening. By the end of the day, we were all sitting tiredly on top of the hill looking up at the setting sunset.

"Thanks you guys, I really do owe you one."

"It's no problem Klein, I'm glad we could help!" Sinon says smiling at him, she eventually did start opening up to Klein and I think they're on pretty good terms.

"Yeah, it's no problem Klein." I say looking out at the setting sunset. I can see more birds beginning to take off from one of the nearby buildings.

"It really is beautiful, huh?" Shino says, sitting next to me

"Yeah, it's crazy that we're actually in a game!" Klein says as he rubs the back of his head, standing up. "Well guys, it's been fun. I got a pizza ordered for 5:30 so I need to get going."

"Ok, see you later Klein, log back in as soon as you can."

"Will do!"

I expected to hear the sound of the logout but nothing came.

"Hey Kirito, total noob question, but how do you logout?"

"Really? It should be right her-" I check my logout menu and see that the button has disappeared. Shino sees this and checks hers, only to find it to be absent as well.

"Come on! It's almost 5:30! I need to get out!"

"Try to contact the GM, maybe they can log you out."

"I've already tried, but he hasn't been responding." Klein tries jumping around in the air and putting his hands over his head trying to remove the helmet

"That won't work, once someone's in the game, they can't move outside in the real world."

"Are you kidding?! How are we supposed to get out then?!"

"I'm sure that the game masters have noticed by now, they must be working on how to fix the problem. Though, they could just force everyone to logout of the game."

"So, why aren't they?"

"You're guess is as good as mine to be honest." Shino says as she lays back into the grass, although her body does not look nervous, I can see it in her eyes. Suddenly, the bells in the Town of Beginnings begin to ring loudly along the country side. We try to move, but we are frozen in place.

"What the hell?!" I hear Klein call out before I feel us being teleported

"Wait, how did we get to the main square?"

I look around and see that many more players are being teleported here. As more and more players start to fill up, I realize that everyone in the game is being summoned to the square. Some look confused, while others look genuinely pissed off. I guess those guys were in the middle of farming.

"What the hell?"

"Is an event?"

"I'm scared."

Various other voices are calling out for an explanation to what is happening. I look up to see a flashing hexagon take shape in the sky, and suddenly the whole sky is turned into a huge dome. Out of the dome comes are large red blob like figure. It looks like blood is coming from the sky. I look back to Shino and see that she is visibly shaking in fear. I try to move toward her, but there are too many people blocking the way. I look back to the blob and see that a massive hooded figure has taking form in the sky. I think that's the game master!

"Welcome players," He says as he opens his arms widely in the sky, casting a large shadow onto the ground. "To my world."

My world?

Wait a minute… That can't possibly be?!

"I am Akihiko Kayaba, and as of right now, I am the sole master of this world."

"I'm sure you have noticed that the logout button is missing from your menu. This is not a defect from the game, this is a feature of Sword Art Online. I repeat, this is not a defect." I look to Shino and she has now completely curled up into a ball and is lightly sobbing. Damnit! I can't get to her!

"As of now, there is no longer any way to respawn in SAO. Once your health bar drops to zero, the microwaves in the NerveGear will take notice, and will then destroy your brain."

"You're insane! If we die in here, we die in real life?!" I hear someone call out

"Yes, that is correct. If someone were to try to remove the NerveGear from your head, that will also destroy your brain. Despite this, some of the players' family and friends have tried to remove the NerveGear from players' heads, and now SAO has 200 less players than when it began."

He's telling the truth…

"As you can see, international news outlets are covering the story as we speak. But there is one way for everyone to escape, if you reach the 100th floor and defeat the boss there, you will clear the game. And everyone will be freed."

If I die in the game… I die in real life…

"I have left a gift for everyone in their inventories, please take a look."

Everyone seems to do so, including Shino although she is still in a ball. The object is a mirror and in it I can see my reflection. Before I can react, everything starts to glow a bright blue. When the light fades, I look down at the mirror and see that it's my actual face. I look to where Klein was and see a somewhat similar looking person.

"Klein?"

"Kirito? Is that you?"

I hear a scream and I look back to see Shino screaming at her reflection with tears in her eyes. I decide to push the people out of my way and I quickly wrap my arms around here, covering her from everyone's sight. Everyone seems to ignore it and turns to look at Kayaba.

"You may be thinking, why? Why would Akihiko Kayaba, creator of Sword Art Online do this?" He pauses as he takes a deep breath. "My goal was simple, to create a world in which I could control and manipulate. Players, I wish you the best of luck in clearing the game." The blob begins to recede back into the sky, returning it to its original color. I hear screams begin to ring out and everyone starts to sprint towards the center in a panic. I quickly grab Shino in a bridal style and proceed to sprint towards the south alleyway. I look behind me to see Klein is following us. Good, I think we can trust him.

We pause in the alleyway to catch our breath while Shino is sobbing into me, gripping me as hard as possible.

"Klein, we need to get to the next town so we can get good farming spots. Once an MMO begins, there's only so much money and weapons that can go around. If we're fast enough we can make it in time, I know all the places we should avoid because of our levels so we'll be fine. Are you ready?"

"Um, Kirito. The thing is… Back in the town square I got a few friends from another game waiting there. I can't just up and leave them, we waited in line all night to buy this game. I appreciate it though, but I can't expect you to risk your life for a couple of strangers. Go on, we'll be fine! Especially with what you taught me, I can teach it to them and I.."

"Fortunately, I am willing to risk my life for some strangers. That's how I met Sinon after all, bring them to the Meadows outside of the south gate. We'll be waiting for you guys."

"Really Kirito? You're the best. I'll be right back." I watch him run off from the alley and I feel Shino grab me tighter.

"You're always the hero aren't you?" Shino says she looks up to me "You're always here to save me whenever I'm in trouble. But I don't know if I can do this, I don't know if I can survive in a death game, I don't kno…"

"Shino. Stop. Remember the promise I made to you? I would never abandon you. Not even if the whole world is against us. We will make it out of this death game and we will continue on with our lives. It's time to put the past behind us, right now, we have to make it through."

She gets off of me and nods to me with a smile.

"Let's go." She says as she gives me a fist bump.

We sprint out of the alleyway and into the residential area. The area is completely devoid of any players, but the NPCs are staring at us as we run like we're strange. Kind of expected as much, they're programmed to act like normal people. We reach the South Gate and teleport out. Taking a look around, we notice that there are a packs of wolves beginning to attack the boars not that it's nearing night time. I pack of boars spots us and begins charging. Shino pulls out the bow that she bought from the one of the NPC shops today and fires a shot over my head, piercing directly through a wolf's head, causing it to burst into hexagons. The other wolves look at their fallen comrade and begin to howl, causing more wolves to appear around us. I get into a ready stance and I move forward to block a wolf from pouncing on Shino. I slash at its head, causing it to fall off and explode into hexagons, but I also notice that there is a bit of blood on the hilt of my blade. Did Kayaba add blood to the game? Ignoring that, I begin to charge into a group of 5 wolves, slashing wildly at them. This causes 2 to die and the others to stumble back. I turn around to see that one was about to pounce me, but Shino took care of it with one shot to its skull.

"Keep going Kazuto, we got 7 of them left!"

I slash at the other three, the first in the side, the second in the leg, and the third in the head which causes them all to die. Only 4 left to go. I notice two pounce at Shino and I try to stop them, but one lands at hit on Shino.

Though the other one just ate a knife to the skull…

Shino throws the other wolf off of her and kicks it in the face, causing it to whimper. She then takes her dagger and rams it into the second wolf's skull. Causing it to shatter into hexagons.

"YO! Kirito! We're here!" I look back to see Klein and his friends running from the main gate, Klein lunges at the remaining two wolves that were trying to flank us and kills both of them. Much to the amazement of his friends.

"Are you guys ok?" Klein asks as he sees Shino's arm

"We're fine, though I did take a pretty nasty hit." Shino says, grabbing her arm, "I'm Sinon by the way, nice to meet you guys." His friends begin to introduce themselves one by one. I don't pay too much attention, but the one with blond hair and green eyes really catches my interest.

"I'm Miles, originally I'm from the US, but my parents died serving in the Iraq war. So, they put me in an orphanage in Japan and now that I'm adult, here I am."

"Yeah, Miles has to be the most OP out of all of us. He's literally good at every single game he plays, it's not even funny." Klein says, grabbing Miles's arm

"It's nice to meet you, I'm Kirito."

"Likewise." He says smiling

"Have you ever been back to the US? I've always wanted to go."

"Only a few times, though I think of Japan as a better home than America."

Ok, now onto business.

"Ok guys, listen up!" I yell, gaining everyone's attention "We're going to be heading to the next town to rest and in the morning we'll be going for some good hunting spots that I've known because of the beta."

"The road to the town is dangerous, especially since it's approaching night time, but we have to make it there. I want everyone to stay together in tight formation. I will let you know what we can and cannot attack as we go. I hope we can all get along!"

They cheer a little bit and start making idle chat with one another as we start to walk down the dirt path. The sun is pretty much completely down and you can see the bright moon shining above. Many stars are also beginning to come out and I am honestly stunned by the beauty of it. Shino notices my staring and I hear her giggle as she rests her body on my shoulder as we walk. I hear some of the guys in the group sigh in what sounds like defeat, especially that Miles guy though. He almost seemed like he wanted to scream at something, but we ignore him for now.

"You know, you're really good at making speeches you know."

"Yeah, I guess I am somewhat."

"It fits giving you were the freshman representative last year."

There's a long silence as we continue to walk along the path, a comforting silence though. But I still have something to say to her, about today and all.

"Hey, Shino." I whisper, despite having strangers in our presence

"Yeah, Kazuto?"

"I want to remind you that this game will not be our end. We will get out of here, no matter what it takes. I am sure that there are many competent minds that can lead us through here. So don't worry." I watch as she begins to tear up a bit more, but she doesn't try to hide it. The guys in front of us notice our touching moment and start to laugh at us.

"Damn, fucking normies man." Miles calls out

"Agreed, total normies over there."

"What's a normy?" I ask only to have them to start laughing. I try to ask them what's so funny but they choose to ignore us and continue on with their conversations. I don't mind though, Shino's company is enough for now. We start to approach one of the middle forests and I tell everyone to remain cautious as we move through. This one is one of the most monster invested on the first floor. Everyone draws their weapons and we start moving slowly through.

"Grrr…" I hear a low growl come from the forest, causing us to stop our movements. Everyone then proceeds to get into a defensive circle, with Miles to the rear, myself to the front, Shino to my right, and Klein to my left. The other guild members fill in the gaps between us and we hear a loud roar echo from the jungle.

*BOOM*

In front of us, stands a 5 meter tall tree giant covered in heavy moss and wielding a massive club.

"Shit."

Author's Note: Okay guys, you have to love me for this chapter. This is like twice the length of any of the chapters. Also, in response and request to Poseidon666, The massive text blocks that I make for this story are for describing a scene or a building. I don't really want to break them up. And also, a shout out to the SAO Fanficition group Sinoto for this type of shipping. Check out the stories on there because they are really good. Also, I want to say to all of my followers **PLEASE REVIEW THIS STORY, I WANT TO SEE FEEDBACK**. Anyway, I hope you guys enjoy this chapter and I'll see you next update. School's about to end soon, which will make writing this much more easily. Also, I'm only 16 so my writing isn't all that great in my opinion, but I want to improve so keep up the criticism. There may be some NSFW bonus chapters that I'll write on a separate website in the future so stay tuned for that. Anyway, see you guys next chapter! 


	5. Chapter 4

Perspective: Shino

*BOOM*

Standing in front of us is a 5 meter tall tree giant wielding a massive club in its left hand. I remember during the beta that these things were ferocious when they attacked. In the beta, I've heard of whole parties on the first floor being wiped out because of these things. Kazuto leaps up at the giant and tries to slam his sword into the middle of its arm, but it moves to block the attack with its club causing Kazuto to slam into the base of a tree to our left.

"Kazuto!" I scream as I run up and pick him up

"I'm fine… The bastard just got me good." Miles quickly runs to us and hands Kazuto a healing potion

"Take this. We're probably going to need you in this fight."

Klein and his group begin to charge at the giant. Two of them block attacks coming from both arms while Klein slashes at its stomach, causing a deep shade of red to appear. It roars in pain and throws its right arm and club around rapidly, causing the two blockers to stumble back. It's about to slam its club directly onto Klein's head as he tries to retreat. Oh no you don't. I reach for my bow and take aim, but before I can fire, I see Miles come directly from behind it and slam his fist into its back. Surprisingly, this causes the giant to stumble and the bar over its head has dropped by 10%. I stare at Miles and realize he's wearing a pair of giant fist o' cuffs. The only person I know who can do that is only…

"PUGNUS!"

"Glad you finally recognized me, Hawk Eye." He slams his fist directly into the giant's head this time which causes it to turn around and swing at him.

"Guys! I'll tank and you DPS from behind! Let's go." Pugnus jumps back and gets into a readied stance. The giant roars at him and slams his club and arm over Pugnus, but he catches the hits causing dirt from the path to fly everywhere. The rest of Klein's group gets behind the giant and starts following Klein's lead, doing simple slashes at the boss. The bar over the giant's health is a little less than 50% now. I take aim with my bow and fire two high powered shots into its side causing the boss to roar in pain and its health to drop to 30%.

"That was too much DPS! Watch out Sinon!" Klein calls out

I look up to find the giant has leaped off the path and is running directly for me and Kazuto. I fire a shot at it, causing it to stumble but that only makes it angrier. The giant is about to slam its club onto us, but I see a black blur shoot in front of me at an unbelievable speed.

"GAH!" Kazuto has his sword drawn and is slashing rapidly at the boss causing it to fall back onto its back. Kazuto uses this moment to rapidly slash at the giant's head and stomach, before burying his blade into the center of its soft heart. The giant finally bursts into blue hexagons and they fly away into the distance. Glad that's over. Everyone breathes a sigh of relief and Klein and his group sit down of the path, except for Pugnus who is walking over to us.

"It's been a while since we've had a fight like that, huh." He says, grabbing Kazuto's hand and pulling him up.

"Yeah, it's been a while. I see your tanking is as good as ever, Pugnus."

"Damn right it is, Kirito. We were in the same guild during the beta you know."

"Yeah, and you always managed to out DPS the other tanks. They're probably still jealous of you, y'know."

"Yeah, I do! Assholes never left me alone on how to do more damage. They don't understand that the fist o' cuffs naturally do more damage and draw more aggro. But everyone just favors their stupid sword and shield. Dumbasses if you ask me." They both start to laugh and I can't help but giggle too

"How've you been, Hawk Eye? Remember good ol' Papa Pugnus? He says grinning at me, I reach up to hug him and he returns it

"Hell yeah I do, I've never had to cover someone's ass so much other than yours."

"Hey! That was only when I was learning to tank!"

"And on every other boss fight."

"No, it wasn't!"

"Yes, it was." Kazuto and the rest of his guild members do

"Shut up you guys! You weren't even in the beta!"

"Yeah, but we've played other MMO's with you and you don't block too much."

Pugnus or Miles sighs in defeat and everyone starts to laugh, including myself. It seems like he never can win anything, huh? After a while of us resting and restoring HP, we continue down the road. All of us taking our original places as we do so. I look over to Kazuto and see that he is scrolling through his inventory. I look down at his money supply and see that he has around 1500 col. I look into my inventory and I notice that I have 1247 col. Did we all just get a thousand col from killing that giant? Kazuto seems to have found something in his inventory and rushes up ahead towards Pugnus. I see Kazuto open up and trade with him and they exchange an item.

"No way! It's a pair of fist o' cuffs!" Pugnus yells, causing everyone in the group to stare at him "It does double the damage of the premium starting one's! This is fucking sweet!"

He does a little fist bump and starts jumping around like a little kid. It seems he and Kazuto have a lot in common on that part.

"Hey, did everyone just get 1000 col from that giant?" Kazuto calls out, causing everyone to open up their inventories and sure enough, everyone did

"Sweet that means we have OVER 9000! Col [1]" (A/N: I'm so sorry, I had too)

Now with that kind of money, we should be able to pay for an inn for the night. We continue to walk along the path, killing anything that gets in our way. There were a few times where we had to maneuver away from too high leveled enemies, like a pack of Tree Hopping Goliaths. Those things are terrifying when you piss them off. Especially if you are a low level. After around an hour of walking, we finally make it to the village. It's surrounded by a 7 meter tall log wall and I see a group of guards patrolling around the front gate. Some of them are dressed in heavy metal armor that covers the arms and torsos, but most of them are completely covered in leather armor, save for the head. They vigilantly watch over the countryside, scanning for any type of monsters to launch an attack on their town. We walk towards them and a group of guards quickly begins to rush towards us. They have their weapons drawn and they quickly surround us. Klein and the rest of his group respond to.

"Halt, no one is permitted to enter the village without special permission from the capital. Turn back, now."

"Kazuto, should we just kill them?" I hear Klein whisper from behind me

"No, I got this." He says as walks up to the nearest guard "We're from the Town of Beginnings and we seek refuge here for the night."

"We cannot afford to let anyone enter the village. Not with the possibility of bandits hiding in the forests."

"What if we could help with that bandit problem?" Kazuto says, causing a quest marker to appear on top of the captain's head

"How do we know if you will actually help? What if you're just a group of bandits trying to sneak into the village and cause chaos?" This causes the guards to ready their weapons and get into readied stances. Everyone is visibly on edge and I see that even Pugnus has drawn his fist o' cuffs.

"We're a group of adventurers from the capital, we're looking for a quick way to make col. As long as there's col, we'll do anything you want us to do." Kazuto says, reaching his hand towards the Captain. He thinks very deeply about this, closing his eyes as he does so. I notice that the quest marker over his head has disappeared

"You have a deal. Follow us." He says causing the guards to lower their weapons and making everyone sigh in relief. We proceed towards the gate where the guards wave us through, allowing us to enter the village. The guards then return to their posts, but the captain whispers something to Kazuto, causing them both to nod and the captain to nod and make his way back to the gate. I try to ask Kazuto about what the captain said but he waves me off, stating that it was just another task to do for the quest. Klein comes up to Kazuto and they begin to talk

"How did you even do that, Kirito? I thought we were going to have to fight the guards and run off into the forest. That would have sucked."

"I guess I'm just good at making scenarios up and going along with them." He says, laughing embarrassedly as he rubs the back of his head. Klein heads back to the group and they begin talking and laughing so I take this time to rest my head on Kazuto's shoulder. All I want to do is go to bed.

"I'm tired…" I say as I further cuddle into Kazuto's side. He's warm…

"Don't worry, we're almost to the inn." He says as he moves his arm to better support me. Looking around the village, I start to take in details about it. Many of the houses are built with light oak walls with straw roofs, but I also notice that some of them are almost completely made of oak. The buildings vary in size, while some stood at two stories, most of them were single story houses occupied by at least one person, but most were occupied by entire families. Candles are lit in most of them and I see some of the NPCs staring at us as we move through. I see a small child with brown hair waving to me from the window and I wave back, until his mother comes from behind and pulls him from the window. Yelling at him for not doing his homework. Reminds me of a certain onyx haired boy I know.

We finally make it to the inn we will be staying at for the night. It stands at roughly 10 meters in height if you exclude the roof, then its 13 meters in height. The inn has a porch stretching 6 meters in length with a small roof supported by 4 large wooden columns. On one of the columns hangs a sign, reading "The Honeyback Inn" with a carving of a house under the words. The building has 2 windows for each floor from the front. All of the bottom one's lit while none on the top were. We enter the inn to be greeted with 5 NPCs drinking at a table in the far corner while a woman with blond hair cleans a cup at the far left of the inn.

"Ah, Welcome to the Honeyback Inn, travelers. Will you be staying for the night or perhaps you would like drinks?"

"My buddies and I would like some of the finest mead ya'll got!" Klein says grinning from ear to ear.

"And for the couple?" This causes Kazuto and myself to blush widely

"Umm, we're not a couple…" Kazuto says in embarrassment

"Oh, my apologies. What would you like then?"

"We'd like a room to stay for the night. How much are they?"

"170 col for the night sir, if you stay three nights you can get the fourth free."

"We'll take that then, here you are." Kazuto says as he pulls out a bag full of col

"Would you like a room as well, ma'am?"

"Yes, I'll take a room. One seco-"Before I can react, Kazuto puts his hand over my mouth

"No, we need to save col." I nod to him and turn to face the waitress

"No thank you, I'll be staying with him."

"Oh? So you are a couple. Don't get the bed sheets messy, I'll have to get th-"

"WE'RE NOT A COUPLE!" We both say in unison causing everyone in the room to laugh. We grab the key to our room and quickly run up the stairs to our room. Kazuto opens the door and we rush inside, slamming the door closed to hide our embarrassment. Kazuto runs towards the bed and jumps into the air with his inventory open and he removes his armor just before he slams onto the bed. He sighs in contentment as he buries his head into the pillows. I can't help but giggle and I move towards the bed and lightly poke his cheek.

"You need to save some room for me too you know, there's only one bed here." He moves over and lays his arm below the pillows, allowing me to snuggle up to him.

"You know, when I first met you I never figured you as a cuddle bug."

"I can't help it, you're my best friend and I can trust you." I say as I turn to face him. There's a long silence between us as we lie there in bed. I can feel the study rise and fall of Kazuto's breath as we stare at the ceiling together. At some point, Kazuto decides to stand up and he looks out the window into the night. I follow behind him and we stare in silence, but we hear the sound of Klein and his group partying bellow us and the dismay of the waitress. We can hear her yelling trying to keep up with all of the orders they're making. Are they trying to blow all of their col on drinks?

"It's beautiful." Kazuto says, breaking the silence between us

"Yeah, it is." I sigh "Kazuto."

"Do you think anyone will recognize who I am in the real world in here?" I say causing him to turn to stare at me "What if they outcast me again? What if they try to hunt us down and try to kill us? What do we do if-"Before I can say anything more, Kazuto puts his hand over my mouth

"None of that matters. Because you have me and I'm sure we have Klein and his group. Plus Pugnus is here. Right now, we need to focus on getting out of this death game. We will not die here. We will not perish from the world. That is something I will promise you." I begin to cry a little bit and Kazuto wraps his arms around me. We move to the bed and I bury my head into his head, drifting into sleep.

Author's Note: Hello everyone! A new chapter with Shino's perspective! Throughout the story, we'll have a change of perspectives to explain character thought, feeling, forshadowing, etc. I did this in less than two hours, but I think it was a really good chapter, although not as long as the last chapter. Anyway, **I REALLY WANT MORE REVIEWS ON THIS PLEASE. MY FOLLOWERS AND FAVORITERS, PLEASE COMMENT.** Anyway, I hope you all enjoyed the chapter and I'll see you in the next!

References:

[1] You should know what the source is by heart if you're on the internet.

Edit: Fixed some Grammer issues in this chapter. I'll probably be fixing the rest later on this week, though I may just completely rewrite the first chapter. I feel kind of dissatisfied with it because it's less than 2000 words


	6. Chapter 5

**Author's Note: Please Review this**

Perspective: Klein

"Uh, my head hurts."

I look up and the view of the inn comes into my vision. The brightness of the sun shines through the windows and covers the room in sunlight. It hurts my eyes really bad nearly causing me to collapse to the ground, but I get up and start looking around. Everyone's lying passed out around the inn, including Miles and the waitress. They're both lying down on each other and the waitress has her arm draped over Miles's back. It turns out that she wasn't an NPC, but an actual player. She told us that she bought the inn back in the beta and because of her premium membership she was allowed to keep it. Ignoring their loud snoring I begin to head toward the counter.

"Now, which room is it?"

I search around the counter and eventually find the room registration log. I look down at the bottom and find their room number, room 7 apparently. I trod up the stairs as lightly as possible due to the loud creaking of the wood. Both for my sake and everyone else's; this hangover really sucks. I continue onward and eventually make it to their door. I wonder what they did while we were downstairs. I reach for the nob and find that the door is unlocked. Wait what? Kirito, it's not very wise to leave your door unlocked. Someone dangerous could walk into your room you know? Wait a minute! I'm not dangerous, that was just… GAH! Whatever! I turn the nob and open the door. Looking inside the room I start studying the details. The walls are lined with oak wood while the floor is a darker oak. It feels smooth under my feet with no kind of dent or possibility of a splinter. To my right, there is a small kitchen with an assortment of pots and even a sink. She's really generous to her visitors huh? A little further away is a small couch fit for two people to sit on. That's strange, this is supposed to be a one bed bedroom. Shouldn't Kirito be sleeping on the couch? I look directly in front of me to see the window and the one-person bed. On it lye two people, Kirito and Sinon. Kirito is lying on his back with an arm around Sinon while Sinon is straddling Kirito waist and having her head resting under Kirito's neck. Aww, that's really cute.

Guess I better mess with them.

Walking to the front of the bed, I lean down and whisper into Sinon's ear.

"Shino, do you want to have some fun in bed?" I say mimicking Kirito as best as I can

"Hmm? I wasn't expecting it so soon, but I'm up for it…" Sinon says in her sleep as she wraps her arms around Kirito tightly. Holy shit! I can't believe she just said that! I know they aren't a couple, but does she seriously feel that way?! Damn Kirito, you lucky son of a bitch! I can't wait to tell the guys about this, they'll be so jealo- Wait a minute, scratch that. This seems like something way to personal. I'll let Sinon handle it. I just hope Kazuto is smart enough to get the hints. I turn around and start to leave until I hear Sinon moan from the bed. I look back to see that she is… huff, grinding. Shit! I need to stop this before it gets bad. I run back and jump into the ear and yell with all of my might.

"GOOD MORNING KIRITO AND SINON!" I yell despite my hangover; this hurts like a bitch.

"Ah!" They scream in unison and quickly jump out of the bed. I laugh as I stare at their bright red faces as they stumble around.

"I, uh, we..." Kazuto tries to explain waving his arms around. I tell them to start to head downstairs so we can order breakfast and I proceed to walk out of the room. I make it downstairs where I see everyone in the inn has woken up due my yelling and are rubbing their eyes. Miles is lying down on the table trying to hide his eyes from the bright sunlight while the waitress stumbles slowly to the counter. Is she seriously planning on working today?

"Klein? What were you doing up there?" The waitress asks me as I come down

"Just waking up our favorite couple, don't worry."

"We're not a couple!" Sinon says groggily as she and Kirito come down the stairs

"From what I saw, you two were pretty comfortable around each other in that bed!"

"Damn, I guess I am going to have to clean the sheets…"

"WE'RE NOT A COUPLE!" They both scream in unison causing everyone in the wince as they laugh. They look confused at our pain but then blink in realization. Good thing these kids are smart enough to know what hangovers are like. While I take a seat down at one of the nearby tables, Kirito and Sinon sit down at the counter and begin talking to the waitress. They seem surprised when they realized she wasn't an NPC and they begin to strike up conversation.

"So you're really not an NPC huh? How'd you get the money for this inn anyway?"

"I don't normally like to reveal that I am a normal player, but with this being a death game I have no choice. I was in the beta test with a premium membership, so I was allowed to keep one building for a small fee."

"I'm Claudia by the way."

"Kirito."

"Sinon…" Shino replies tiredly, I guess she's not a morning person

"I don't know about you guys, but I'm starving. What do you have to eat here Claudia?"

"I can make biscuits in the back. Sorry, my cooking level isn't that high yet."

"More importantly, what's it going to cost?" Miles says standing up slowly from his spot at the table

"10 col each, that's a lot off of what I normally charge you kn-" Before anyone can react. Claudia's hair flashes brightly much to the despair of everyone in the room and myself. Looking up, I see that Claudia's hair has turned to a silver color.

"Claudia, is your hair naturally silver?" Kirito asks from the counter

*Sigh*

"Yes. I prefer using hair dye though, I think it looks better blond."

"I don't know what the hell you're thinking, that silver hair looks hot to me." Miles says grinning from his chair with a slight nose bleed. Claudia and Sinon come over to knock him down for that comment and I can't help but laugh. We ended up ordering about 30 biscuits completely emptying Claudia's supply of grain. She seemed a little down about that but I think she'll have enough to go buy more. I hope. I better be a gentleman and offer her some of my col, that's what true gentlemen do in these types of sit-

"Hey Claudia, if you're low on col you can take some of mine, I already got my weapon for this floor anyway." Miles says from his chair

"Really? That'd be a big help to me, thank you Miles!"

"No problem." Damn you Miles, you girl stealing bastard!

"Alright everyone, listen up!" Kirito exclaims as he stands on top of a table, luckily we all recovered from the hangover for the most part.

Perspective: Kazuto

"Alright everyone, listen up!" I say as I meet their expecting stares "Remember that we didn't come here to relax, we still have a quest to fulfill for this town."

"I want us to be ready in about an hour, our time is limited. We have to level so we can fight the first floor boss." This causes many worried whispers to break out between them, except for Pugnus and Shino who are staring at me with serious expressions.

"So, how are we going to organize for this quest? From what the Captain of the Guard said, the bandits are scattered throughout the entire forest." Pugnus asks from his seat while sipping water from a cup

"Since we don't know where exactly their camp is, I think we should split up into two different groups."

"I think it be best if myself and Kirito went alone in a group." Shino says walking up to me. This causes everyone in the room to start snickering at us

"Getting it on in the forest I see? Well, have fun you two!" Pugnus says laughing as we rocks back in forth in his chair in laughter

"WE'RE NOT A COUPLE!" We both say in unison trying to hide our embarrassment

"Yet. But anyway, more importantly, I think it's a good idea for you two to be alone in a group." This causes everyone to stare at him with confusion "I've seen Kirito and Sinon fight, they operate as a lone duo. They are most effective when they are by themselves. Kirito is pretty much a tank because he draws so much aggro with all of his DPS while Sinon is great at support keeping enemies off of the tanks. This allows them to take as little damage as possible." Everyone starts nodding

"Alright, Sinon and I will be in our party, but it's up to you guys if you want to divide into two separate parties." They ended up talking for over half an hour and it ended up with Pugnus leading a group of 3 while Klein led a group of 4. As they were talking Shino came over to rest her head on my shoulder. I guess she's still tired. I let her rest for a while but after they were done, I woke her up and we began moving out of the inn, bidding Claudia farewell for now. Looking out at the village, I see that it is teaming with activity. NPC children are running around chasing one another while their parents are looking into shops and talking along the dirt pathway. A few of them have horses carrying supply carriages throughout the village. Some of the NPCs spot us and are staring at us with a mixture of awe and fear, but we choose to ignore them as we continue to head toward the wall. Standing there waiting for us are the Captain and a few other guards who have their weapons drawn.

"Captain."

"Adventurers." We greet as we shake each other's hand. This NPC has a tight grip

"I am grateful that you are doing this. I would like to, but I got a family to take care of."

"It's not a problem. Do you have any information on where the bandits might be?"

"Last our scouts saw, they were in the Northeast of the forest. I wish you luck, all of you."

"We'll do our best." I say as we wait for them to lower the gate. I watch two guards run up the staircase and man the gears pushing with all of their might. The large gate opens slowly allowing us to see the massive forest in front of us. It looks completely different from at night. The green treetops reflect light off their leaves and it gives an aura of peace. Sadly though, this is one of the most dangerous forests on the first floor. We walk out of the gate and onto the dirt path as guards from patrol points turn their attention towards us. Upon realizing who we were, they quickly went back to their patrol routines. We sprint on the dirt path towards the forest and I look back to see the gate is closing. No going back now. As we get deeper into the forest, we all split up with myself and Shino going right while Klein and Pugnus's groups head left splitting up. After running for at least 10 minutes, we slow our pace and we survey the area. The forest floor is covered in ferns and shrubs and the trees stand at least 10 meters tall. A little bit of sunlight is able to shine through the canopy giving the forest floor a low lighting. The terrain of the forest seems to be mostly hills giving the random rise and fall of the ground. As we continue onward, we spot a small stream that has formed out of the cracks of the rock. Various wildlife surround the stream gathering water of nesting. Before I can react, Shino pulls me to the ground and forces my head into the soil.

"Don't move, but look." I look to see 4 Tree Hopping Goliaths standing in the middle of the stream, drinking the water. They have 4 eyes on their head and the stand roughly 4 meters long. Their long slender legs hold their wide bodies over the water. Their slimy skin is a light green color with various dark green spots covering the body. Various spikes line their body and their long tongues are directed at the water as they drink. These things are often extremely hostile and have the potential to wipe out entire parties with their force. Their tongues can burn cloth and destroy armor in seconds. Shino really hates these things because they caused us to die on our way to the village at least 12 times in the beta. She must be terrified right now. After a while of us watching, they finally take off into the forest, heading westward. We sigh in relief and we stand up wiping dirt off of our armor.

"Those things are assholes."

"Tell me about it, we should stay away from them as much as possible."

"Agreed."

We continue walking through the forest until we come across a small settlement in the middle of the forest. It has walls made out of timber from the nearby area and there are shady looking dudes patrolling around the entrance. I think we found the bandit camp. I open up my menu and to send Klein and Pugnus a message.

 _Hey guys, we ended up finding the bandit camp. I'm sending you our cords now. Also, watch out for Tree Hopping Goliaths as you go through the forest, we just spotted a pack of four on our way here. Pugnus, I'm pretty sure you could handle them but as for you Klein, don't attack them and if they spot you run as fast as possible and get everyone away. They are extremely dangerous. We'll wait for you here._

With that being sent, I look up to see that Shino is gone. I look around quickly trying to find her and see that she is already assaulting the guards at the front of the camp. She's dropped 3 of them but 4 of them remain. One of them quickly runs into the camp and sets off a loud bell alarm. Shit, they know we're here. I quickly jump down towards the encampment and lay waste to 2 bandits in front of me. Stabbing one of them in the stomach while cross parrying with the other and slicing an arm off. The bandit screams in pain before they both disappear into polygons. Shino takes out the other 2 bandits with 2 shots to the head. I thought she'd be bothered with killing something that looks human but she seems hell-bent on something.

"Shino! Why didn't you wait for the others to get here?! We can't take them on by ourselves without knowing how many of them there are!"

"We're fine, Kazuto! We've done this kind of thing many times before." She says as she fires and arrow wounding one of them.

"Gah! Damnit!" I yell as I charge at a group of them coming from the forest. I cross swords with one of them as another tries to stab at me. I quickly flip into the air and kick the bandit in the jaw, causing him to stumble back. I raise my sword and strike at the body of the bandit in front of me causing a large red slash to appear down his torso before he bursts into polygons. I quickly ram my sword into the bandit I kicked back causing him to burst into polygons and my sword to get stuck in a tree. A bandit lets out a war cry behind me before trying to slice at me but I roll back and kick his legs out from under him causing him to slam into the ground. I yank my sword from the tree and slash at him but he blocks with his sword and is able to get back to his feet. We cross swords again but I was able to grab his arm and twist it around. I feel his bones snap in half and he screams in pain. I ram my blade through his back and he disappears into polygons. I don't notice the bandit behind me and he tackles me to the ground while trying to ram a knife into the back of my head. I move my head despite not being able to see him away from the knife and I head butt him causing him to rear back. This allows me to kick upwards knocking him off of me and to regain my footing, He slashes wildly at me as he charges with his dagger so I quickly grab my sword and meet him. I knock the blade out of his hand and slice his neck, killing him.

Looking back to Shino, I see that she is taking care of other bandits near the camp entrance. She has her dagger in her left hand as she holds her bow. She does a flip to avoid being stabbed by one of the bandits and she rams 3 arrows directly into 3 bandits dropping them and causing their bodies to burst into polygons. We press into the camp and fight our way all the way to what we presume to be the command tent. I guess they noticed the commotion from outside because the run out to meet us. 4 guards dressed in heavy metal armor surround a large 2 meter tall man wielding a giant axe.

"How did a few tiny rats infiltrate my base?" He asks as he steps forward trying to intimidate us

"We've heard of your attacks of the nearby village, we're here to stop you."

"Is that so? Bring it, foolish adventurer." He says as he lunges toward Shino at a lightning fast speed trying to slam his axe over her head. Luckily I jumped over to her and blocked the attack

"Impressive puny one, but it'll take more than that to stop me."

"Roger that." I say as I run towards him and try to slash at his side. He reaches forward and grabs me with his large hand and slams me to the ground. Damn, that hurt like a bitch! Shino has recovered and fires a barrage of arrows, killing one of the guards.

"Kazuto, I got the guards you deal with him!"

"Okay!"

The guards chase after Shino while I am alone with the behemoth in front of me. With all of my energy, I move as quickly as possible behind him and land a large slash onto his back. He moans in pain before turning around and slamming his axe into the ground causing dirt to fly into the air

"You'll pay for that!"

I counter his attack and kick at his leg, causing him to stumble forward before landing another slash on his arm but not removing it. His roars in anger and he proceeds to glow red and grow. I look up to see that a boss bar has formed on his head with the name as _Blood Rain the Berserker_. Shit! A field boss! I have to kill this thing quickly! I activate a sword skill and slam it into his chest, causing him to lose 10% of his health. He roars in pain and tries to attack me but I am able to move to the side. As I thought I was safe, his axe lands a hit causing me to slam into the wall of the camp. He lunges at me again and before he can hit me, two arrows lodge into his side causing his health to go down to 70. He turns to look at Shino who has completely wasted the rest of the guards. He roars and charges at her, but not before I am able to knock him down and ram my sword at his chest. This causes him to lose 40% of his health, leaving him at his last bar. He roars and causes a massive dust storm to form as he swings his axe around. Shino takes this opportunity to ram 3 arrows into him, dropping him finally. The congratulations message comes up in front of us and we sigh in relief.

"Good work." We say in unison as we give each other high fives. I lay back onto the ground to catch my breath and relax. That was a pain in the ass, especially for it to be morning.

"Hey Kazuto."

"Hmm?"

"That field boss dropped a one handed sword and a bow. Wanna take a look?"

"Sure, why not." She trades it over to me and I begin to look over its stats. This does double the damage of what my current one does?! I equip it and find that it is extremely heavy. Just the way I like it

"From your drooling over there, I can tell you like what you got."

"You aren't wrong. Thanks, Shino."

"No biggie." She says as she sits down and I follow her. After a while of us just resting quietly we hear screams come from the forest.

"KIRITO!"

"SHINO!"

We look up to see Klein and Pugnus as well as the rest of the group running towards us as fast as they can.

With the same pack of Tree Hopping Goliaths from before….

Shit.

Shino and I quickly jump up and start sprinting out of the bandit camp and into the forest towards them to meet them. I hope we don't lose anyone in this fight.

Author's Note: Sorry for the long wait everyone, exams have been killing me lately. I hope you guys enjoyed the chapter and please, **REVIEW**. See you next time!


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